Well, my Kiyone costume was quite successful. My Gaga orbit… not so much. Between the heat and the time constraints and the stress, the costume fell apart. I was so crushed, but I’ve shelved it for another day. It will get done for next year’s con season. Anyway, back to Kiyone. I don’t have an amazingly clear photo on here of the guns, but Theresa and I took dollar store toy guns, shaped them with cardboard and covered them with Bondo body filler and acrylic paint. They were amazing. My wig was a bitch. I couldn’t afford a nice blue wig, so I went to the local costume shop and bought the cheapest, longest blonde wig that I could (24in for $9) and bought a tube of blue acrylic paint and dyed it myself. It took a lot of trial and error to get the wig remotely close to the color I wanted. I had to thin out the hair and trim it slightly because of the dying process. ugh… The costume was fairly simple, the vest was a modified simplicity pattern that I used blocking techniques for the chest stripes and applique for the black curves. The skirt and leggings were recycled from my Meryl Stryfe costume and the gloves and headband were made out of the t-shirt I used on my Mario costume and leftover yellow scraps. The black undershirt was drafted by me and I made it completely on my “new” serger (new to me anyway). Then I drafted a collar to attach to the undershirt and the red “tie” is red scraps stuffed with stuffing. The blue triangles on our shoulders were crafted by me out of sculpty.

I loved this costume. It was fairly comfortable. And as disappointed as I was over my Gaga costume, I was very happy that this one worked out. Most of the pictures above were found, so if I took your picture and you want credit please let me knpw.

I almost forgot! Here is how my tricorder purse turned out

You notice the title is plural? There’s a reason, I’m currently working on 3 costumes simultaneously. Yes, I’m crazy, I know. But this is what I love.

For some reason we haven’t gotten around to taking the photos of the Marowak costume because I’ve been to busy reorganizing my closet/room and constructing 2 costumes. Yeah, I’m busy. The earliest those pictures are being done is probably in two weeks.

Right now I’m constructing the cardboard base for my Lady Gaga orbit costume (Another reason I’m reorganizing my closet, to find as much usable cardboard as possible without buying any. Been successful so far.). The body is almost done, then I have to paper mache it and create the rings before bondoing and painting. I have almost 4 weeks left to finish it and it will probably take 3 1/2 weeks to construct it.

Along with the Gaga costume, I have 4 weeks to complete my Kiyone costume. I’ve gather most of the materials and once I get to the paper mache stage of Gaga costume, I’m going to start constructing this it. The Gaga costume is hogging my dressform and I need to use it to draft and fit the vest pattern for the Kiyone costume. I’m only making the vest, undershirt, headband and gloves (and maybe guns if there are any supplies left from the Gaga costume and time) and reusing the leggings, boot covers and skirt from my Meryl Stryfe costume because of time and money. I have to buy a wig and that money went towards that.

Now, the third costume. Last summer I made a blue Star Trek Mirror Universe costume. This year I had planned to go as Lt. Saavik to our annual sci-fi convention, however the Marowak costume set me back a few weeks and dollars for all of my costumes which are being made and used within a couple of weeks of each others (Or, like Kiyone and Gaga, the same weekend), I had to drop Lt. Saavik as this is the first week I’ve had to work on my own costumes. Seeing as the convention is next weekend and my costume form last year is still in good shape and barely worn, I’m recycling it. I am adding an accessory to it because I want something new for this con and there is something I say I’m always going to make with my costumes but never do, a matching purse. Every time I make a costume I always say I should make a matching purse so that I’m not carrying my yellow kitty bag or my guitar purse that doesn’t go with say the Slowpoke costume. AND I always have shit tons of fabric left over after every project that I just don’t know what to do with. Th only costume that I have really done this with (and forgot about…) was my Team Rocket Grunt costume. I made a small Pokeball purse to carry around, but it was really too small to carry anything. Well, I’m taking the scraps from my Meryl cape, the Team Rocket hats, the padding/pattern from my Gaga orbit (Yeah, despite it being made out of bondo and cardboard, it will have some fabric on it), and a random yard of remnants I found while cleaning to create a matching tricorder purse. It’s about the size of an iPad carrier with a small pocket in front. I tried to get it close to the actual dimensions of the toy ones you can buy in ThinkGeek. Of all these projects, this one will be done soonest. I’ll post pictures as soon as it’s done.

Also, I got accepted on this film internship program in Los Angeles and am leaving July 30th-August 7th. I’m so hoping a job comes from it, but we’ll see. (And either the week I come back or doing labor day week, I’m going to visit my sister in Minnesota as she is having a baby around the 10th) Anyway, I’m really busy preparing for that as well, I may open an Etsy shop here in a few weeks to help me moneywise and to sell some of the jewelry that I’ve somehow managed to squeeze out while making these insane costumes and organizing my room. I’ll put up some pictures of what I’ve made so far. I have a couple of button necklaces and a pretty rosary that someone might be interested in. I’ve been motivated/inspired to make accessories out of all the scraps that I’ve found lately, so I’m sure I’ll been making quite a few things to help get rid of it all and make a little extra money so look out for that.

Anyway, that’s what I’m up to/going to be up to in the next few weeks and hopefully some pictures will trickle in.

So, we didn’t take pictures of Marowak last week because we went to a pool party to deliver it and I nearly drowned. HOWEVER, I have been search the interwebs for A-Kon photos as people upload them and it found THIS:

AH!! It turned out so well. I never got to see the whole thing put together until now.

I’ve decided that if anyone is interested in a costume commission, I think I’ll take it in. To give you an idea of prices, something like this would start at $500 and go up. The suit itself can be done for $150 and the bone and head combo for $350.

I finished Marowak today, just in time to hand it over to Steven tomorrow before he leaves for A-kon.

Let’s see, I had a lot a problems since the last post. I finished the bone first and painted it as it was the easier piece to sand and paint.

Before painting

After painting.

I got a little too carried away and used the whole paint can on the bone. I also had problems getting the head sanded and smooth. I never got it completely smooth, I should have sanded it completely then reapply bondo to the pitted areas. However, I ran out of bondo a long time ago and didn’t want to buy more. I also had to buy a hand sander because the sander attachment on the rotary tool wasn’t cutting it. But all that aside, it got done.

Pre-paint

Painted

The paint made it look really beat up, so I’m going to say this marowak is battle worn.

Next for the eyes I used plastic canvas with a layer of organza sewn on.

Then I used sharpie to draw on the eyes.

Then I glued them in and put a felt lining in. Then it was done, see!

Tomorrow I should have pictures up of the completed costume.

It’s so hot outside, so it’s been hard to work on the Marowak costume. I put body filler on the head and bone on Monday. I went out of town Tuesday and came back last night. So, this is what the Marowak looked like earlier this afternoon.

I started sanding today, but it’s going slow because I have to work outside and it’s been about a 100 degrees today. Hopefully it will be finished by monday. Hopefully…

I thought I’d post some more pictures. I made a bone prop. Here it is in the early stages.

I was kind of an idiot and accidentally bought fiberglass resin instead of body filler like I had intended. However, all was not lost because the fiberglass gave the pieces a little more strength but it was a bitch to apply and sand. I injured my hand sanding the pieces and sanding the bone, I must say, looked very suggestive. lol. Anyway, I ended up getting a small and cheap rotary tool with a sanding attachment to finish up. This was how the pieces looked earlier today after sanding and cleaning.

After this picture was taken, I coated the headed in body filler. I only had a small 14oz can and managed to cover only half the head. So, I went and bought some more. I got the head covered and half the bone. Now, I just got to sand it down and paint it. It’s almost done!  ^_^

My friend Steven asked me to make a Marowak costume for him. I’ve been slowly trying to work on it all semester, but with my crazy school schedule I was only really able to plan it out and start the base structure of his head piece. In the week I’ve been home, I completed the jumpsuit and the cardboard structure of his head piece and the paper mache layer. I also made some jewelry, but I’ll save those for another post. Anyway, the jumpsuit is made from the same pattern (and left over bias tape because I hardly ever use that stuff) as my Slowpoke costume with modifications. First, I had to draft a new belly piece and quilt it to create an “ab-like” appearance that Marowak has. I also had to create a custom tail. It’s larger than the one I created for the Slowpoke and densely packed with stuffing. It pulls badly in the back, but the once someone is wearing the jumpsuit, the tail holds up well without support. Seeing as this costume is made for someone who is taller and all around bigger than me (not everyone is 5’2” and 120lbs apparently), I had great trouble being pleased with my work and worried it didn’t fit. I visited Steven this past weekend and it fit him perfectly. Unfortunately, I don’t have any photos of him in it, so here is what I do have  (which doesn’t look very impressive).

Now for the head, I’m trying something new that I’ve been wanting to try. If it’s successful, I’m going to start my most epic costume ever after this one. Anyway, I’m making the head out of Bondo. Bondo is an automotive liquid fiberglass that you can buy at Wal-Mart fairly cheap. So, I saved up a bunch of light cardboard from things like cereal boxes and formed a head structure like this that was finished on Sunday.

It’s not perfect, but I’m very impressed with the results. On Monday, I did the next stage of the head; papermache. This smooths out the cardboard before the application of the Bondo.

The update on this costume I should hopefully have covered the head in Bondo.

Interestingly enough, most of my costumes this year require less sewing and more construction.

So, around the time of my birthday it was announced that Lady Gaga was adding extra tour dates and one of them just happened to be at my home! As a b-day gift to myself I purchased tickets for myself. Before I did this I had already planned a Lady Gaga costume for 2011. This:

However, as awesome as this costume is, it is too cumbersome to wear to a concert. But I plan to use it as my primary cosplay this year. For the concert I have already begun to work on this one:

As you can see, I chose some pretty revealing costumes this year so far. I’ve been trying to get into shape for them both. The concert is April 4th, so if I’m not in shape by spring break (which is two weeks before the concert), I might switch to the costume Gaga wore on American Idol. I didn’t realize until the other day that it is made almost entirely of zippers. It just appeals to the crafter in me.

I’m going to need to buy three different wigs this years because my anime cosplay for the year, much like Lady Gaga is above, isn’t a brunette like me. Theresa let me pick out our duo cosplay this year. I decided on doing Kiyone and Mihoshi from Tenchi. We had trouble deciding who would be who, but we quickly decided out of my financial necessity and lack of time. Theresa will be Mihoshi and I will be Kiyone as one of Kiyone outfits will basically recycle the skirt, leggings and boot covers from my Meryl costume. 

And finally, when I was in high school I had purchased a Lt. Saavik jacket pattern from Trek Expo. I finally have decided to do it (And I’m doing the Kristie Alley Savvik, not Robin Curtis’s). However, if I get into good shape for the Lady Gaga costumes, I may trade in Saavik for a more famous and daring Star Wars costume ;)

I haven’t done a cosplay post in a while. This costume is the one I’ve designated as the “1 Anime Cosplay of the Year” costume for four reasons. 1-I made two anime cosplays last year within 6 months of each other and it was expensive even though I worked at a fabric store. 2-I skipped sci-fi cosplay last year because I did two costumes so close together. 3-I go to a lot of anime cons. Between 2-4 a year and that is hard to make a new cosplay for each one, especially since most of them are within three months of each other. And 4-School doesn’t allow me the time to make one with such frequency. I think I made 3 or 4 costumes total last year, it was a lot. Anyway, this is Sailor Iron Mouse for Sailor Moon.

Now, some people don’t know who she is because she is in Sailor Stars. They did not adapt Sailor Stars for American TV like the rest of the series because it was too complicated to make it friendly for American children. Particularly because the Sailor Stars themselves were men half the time and the other half the were scantily-clad and various other reasons. Iron Mouse is one of the villains in this series. I went back and forth last year trying to decide if I wanted to be her or Queen Nehellenia. Either way, I wanted to be a villain and I was going to need a wig. I think the two major deciding factors for Iron Mouse was that it required less fabric, I could buy cheaper fabric because it was white and black (And I had b&w fabric left over from the Meryl costume) and already had hot pants and gloves.

I started the costume over x-mas break and worked on it whenever I came home from school. So, this costume took a lot longer than it should have for that reason. And this costume had so many problems… I almost gave up and went as Meryl again. The top was a self drafted pattern made out of cotton and maybe gabardine. I actually am unsure, I remember the fabric was on the same aisle as gabardine. The top is also made with black double and single fold bias tape, the gloves and the ear puffs(bunny tails) were purchase at a local costume store, the original wigs and beads were bought at a costume store in Norman, the fur is a fake trim, the tights came from Wal-Mart and the boots (the best deal I found ever) I found for $16 on clearance at Tops and Bottoms. The boots were probably the easiest of the things I bought to find. I had a budget for the wig and a particular length I wanted because this has been the only time that I’ve designed a wig. I didn’t find a wig until almost 3 weeks away from the con and it took me 2 weeks to fix it. I found 2 glow in the dark wigs for $20. I trimmed one and tucked under the length and made a bob with hot glue. I took the 2nd wig and made 2 ponytails, set them aside and took the extra hair and added it to the bobbed wig because it had bald spots where the wig lace showed through. I added the ponytails and sewed on the beads as well as the ears which I made with felt. I had the hardest time finding white tights and I had trouble finding them in my size.

The costume was the hardest part. The lower half gave me so much trouble, I tried to make it poofy by making it like a bubble-skirt. I misjudged the size and it didn’t really poof. Then it was too big at the top where it attached to the bikini top half. I tried to create an elastic channel twice and it didn’t work. I took it apart and tried to add a petticoat, but that didn’t work. I attempted the elastic channel again and it finally worked.

My tail didn’t turn out quite right. It is composed of many pipe cleaners. Even though it didn’t turn out right, I got the look I was looking for.

The boots are interesting, they are knee high. I folded them over and created the trim piece to slip over the fold and cover it up. I attached it with double-sided tape so I could use the boots again for something else.

I like the end result. It was a fun costume and probably the most revealing thing I’ve ever worn in public. I think I was the only character that was from Stars. I plan to wear it to Izumicon in November. ^_^